MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti commentator Dmitry Babich) - Deadly fires at nightclubs and other public places have become, unfortunately, common and nearly universal.
What these various tragedies have in common is that they usually occur around Christmas or New Year and are often the result of someone's irresponsible decision to use fireworks inside a building, either due to unruly and destructive motives or a false interpretation of rock-and-roll traditions. Rooms in nightclubs are usually packed with flammable materials, and the ceiling is usually the first part of a room to ignite, causing a deadly rain of fire. Most deaths occur not from the fire itself, but by asphyxiation from burning plastic gasses.
Some of the deadliest nightclub fires include:
- the 1942 fire at the Cocoanut Grove nightclub, in Boston, the United States, with a death toll of 492;
- the 2000 fire in Luoyang, China, which left 309 dead; and
- the 2004 fire in the Republica Cromagnon Nightclub in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which left 194 dead.
Although a fire can happen in any country, the resulting investigation and the consequences differ considerably. The stronger the civil society in a country, the stronger people's outrage, the more thorough the official investigation and, finally, the more impact it eventually has on life in that country.
All investigations usually start in the same place. Since most nightclubs operate within the "shadow economy", it usually turns out that the business has been registered to people who have no connection whatsoever with the fatal party.
This is exactly what happened at the Santika Club in Bangkok, Thailand, where an explosion killed 65 people on January 1, 2009. During the investigation it turned out that the building was registered as a private home and located in a neighbourhood where nightclubs were not officially allowed, and that the commissioning architect's signature was a fake. The club's management has also been reprimanded on a number of occasions.
Nevertheless, so far no one has been given a prison sentence, while the soloist from a band with the unfortunate name of Burn, whose ill-advised use of fireworks presumably caused the fire, was released on a $20,000 bail. No official announcement has been made as to the cause of the fire, which means only administrative penalties can be applied to the club managers, who were merely fined for admitting underage guests.
The repercussions of the December 30, 2004 fire in Buenos Aires were very different. Although the club was opened by Omar Chaban, a legendary leader of the Argentinean underground rock movement in the early 1980s, public protests against the death of 194 people made it impossible for the culprits to remain unpunished.
Thousands-strong demonstrations of the victims' families and their supporters were held on the 30th of each consecutive month to commemorate the tragedy. These demonstrations did not allow the government authorities, parliament or the courts to forget what had happened. As a result, Omar Chaban was sentenced to 20 years in jail last August, nearly five years after the tragedy, and the manager of the group that played that night receive an 18-year sentence.
That was not all. Argentineans were also outraged that President Nestor Kirchner, who at the time was on a trip to his native province of Santa Cruz, did not rush back to Buenos Aires immediately to help the victims, and in fact stayed away from the capital and made no comment for another four days. The Argentine media and public have never forgiven for this and probably never will.
Even so, the outraged nation allowed the president to finish his term, although the mayor of Buenos Aires was not so lucky and lost his post. Shortly after the tragedy, Mayor Anibal Ibarra asked the city hall to hold a referendum on whether he should stay in office or leave. The voter turnout was too low for the referendum to be binding, but the mayor still forced to resign a year after the accident by the same procedure that had removed U.S. President Richard Nixon from office in 1974.
The reason for Ibarra's resignation was the fire at Republica Cromagnon.
Given that the accident cost the mayor his job, one can imagine what the local fire brigades and other nightclubs have been put through. Argentina still feels the "Cromagnon effects," and Buenos Aires nightclubs are among the safest in the world.
These two stories describe two different reactions to the sort of tragedy that has just struck Russia. Such an event is not just a common tragedy in a democratic society: It is also a test - for the government and civil society alike.
The opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.
